


Good Luck via Palms

by scintillio_coll



Category: Moana (2016)
Genre: F/M, Gen, Why do I do this, just me forcing characters into the endings i want, meandering nonsense, pre-romance stuff, you can't just walk on a literal goddess and expect nothing to happen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-08
Updated: 2017-07-08
Packaged: 2018-11-29 15:03:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11443356
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scintillio_coll/pseuds/scintillio_coll
Summary: “It must be Te Fiti.”He raises his eyebrows at her, knowing she’ll feel the force of his expression even if she probably can’t see him down by the rudder.“There’s life everywhere,” she grins to herself and he feels that even without seeing her face. “What else could it be?”





	Good Luck via Palms

When he finally visits, it’s been months, and her mother is swollen with child. 

“It was a surprise, to be sure!” Sina says a bit breathlessly. “I’m still not sure how I feel!”

But Moana’s father just smiles broadly as Maui rests a palm gently on her belly. “Well, I’m sure I’m very pleased,” Tui rumbles. 

In retrospect, that was the first hint. He doesn’t beat himself up over missing it, though. 

As nice a lady she seems to be, he’s not there to see Moana’s _parents._ Yes, he enjoys everyone in the village because every new person he meets is an opportunity to be _impressive_ and _awesome_ and _unforgettable_ but they’re not why he came to Motunui. Between seeing her, her island, the celebrations (there were so many things worth celebrating!), and the thrill of telling the story of his new tattoo, it gets lost. 

Instead, he enjoys taking the villagers out on the ocean, puffing out a bit in pride as Moana easily teaches them something that could have stayed forgotten. He finds amusement in her playful interactions with the ocean, tossing her overboard with good-humored mischief only to have her instantly spit back. And, with a couple weeks of pointed dedication, he finally, _finally_ gets Drumstick plump enough to eat. It’s a pointless project, he knows. He'd literally be starving (if demigods _could_ starve), and the chicken would somehow outlive him. 

It eventually happens, as they both knew it would, his feet itch and his hook seems bored so he scoops her up in a hug and, with a promise to be back, departs. He zaps into the form of a whale, breaching just beyond the reef. 

 —————

The beginning of the rainy season reminds him to take account of the months; it always startles him to realize how he’s allowed them to slip by. How far has she managed to go?

He does the math- the baby’s been born by now, for sure, and has probably transitioned into that cute phase where it can laugh and hold things in its little hands. 

He likes the thought of someone new to ingratiate himself to, remembers that Mini Maui has a knack with kids.

The moon is full and the rains have temporarily paused as he glides down to the island, his hawk eyes picking out a lone canoe in the lagoon. On a whim he dives down, swimming up slowly in the form of a monumental whale shark so she is sure to see him coming. She pokes his massive back with her paddle and he hears her muffled laugh, still youthful and unrestrained, morph into a shriek as a careful flick of his tail capsizes her.  

He’s back on human legs when she reaches the shore, and rolls her eyes as he picks the canoe up one handed, thumping it back into line with the rest of the fleet. 

“You just _have_ to make an entrance.” 

They pull each other into a hongi, and he decides that after a thousand years feeling pretty pissed and forsaken, it’s nice to have someone greet him like a friend. 

He has, after all, never pulled one of her legs off. 

He sweeps his arms wide as they part, “The Mighty Maui has returned from the sea to bestow his blessings on Motunui and its newest prince or princess!” 

She blows a raspberry at him with the titles but doesn’t seem _that_  irritated. 

“Can the bestowal of blessings wait until morning?” she bends to brush a shard of shell from her foot, and her necklace catches the moonlight, as does her hair and her ridiculously wide eyes, everything about her illuminated. “It’s the middle of the night.” 

As if he hadn’t noticed, “What brought you out then, kid?”

They quietly shuffle along as the path transitions from sand to hard-packed dirt, “Gramma sometimes comes by on nights like this.” 

—————

After a simple breakfast spent cradling Moana’s chubby baby brother in the crook of one arm, Mini Maui shaking his mini hook like a silent rattle, Moana takes him for a walk. There’s a distinct lack of urgency as they meander through the coconut groves, up onto a ridge so she can point out their new fishing grounds in the shallows and then beyond to deeper spots. 

Motunui seems brighter somehow, greener than his memory preserved. He resolves to make landfall more, to really appreciate the brilliance of the earth he’d hauled into sunshine. 

 _You’re welcome_. 

A couple afternoons later, while he dozes in the shade of the Meeting Hall, he finds himself approached by, perplexingly, half a dozen pregnant women. With varying shades of awkwardness, forwardness, and awe, they ask him to touch their bellies. 

“My mom,” Moana shakes her head as she takes him by the elbow and gently pries him away. “The birth went really well. They think…” she waves her hands around dramatically, “Maui, Shapeshifter, Demigod of the Wind and Sea and All Around Good Luck Charm!” 

She giggles at his deadpan expression, “Kid, you don’t need luck when you’ve got me, but even I can’t-“

“I know, I know, and so do they,” she takes his arm again (he really should be bothered by how she thinks she can just drag him around), and tugs towards the shore.

“But you can,” she sings, “Sharkhead around a little and point me towards some tuna!”

 —————

In the end he hardly has to, the waters off Motunui virtually shimmer with scales, undulating masses of life feeding and being fed on. Out on the water, looking back to the land with the sun still hot and big overhead, it appears almost unworldly, over-the-top idyllic. 

That’s the second hint and he misses that, too. 

Moana’s sprawled across the deck, drying herself as the sun begins its first descent (they’ve yet to be on a boat together that he doesn’t push her off of), when she says, “It must be Te Fiti.” 

He raises his eyebrows at her, knowing she’ll feel the force of his expression even if she probably can’t see him down by the rudder. 

“There’s life _everywhere,_ ” she grins to herself and he feels _that_ even without seeing her face. “What else could it be?” 

—————

He stays through two of the six of his blessed births, both easy, quick, and untroubled affairs where mother and child are left strong and vibrant. Afterwards, everyone nods at him with weird gratitude. He likes gratitude, it’s kinda his _thing_ , but it doesn’t bring as much satisfaction when he knows he’s hasn’t done anything. 

“I am _not_ getting stuck the demigod of squeezing out minnows!” he tells her. “I’m taking off, I need to steal something or wrestle someone again.” 

She just laughs at him, wiggles her fingers at Mini Maui, and pulls him down by the ear for a hug, “Hahana’s due any day, how can you abandon her?” 

He just scoffs and shoves her away, “For that, I’m gonna kill something, too.”

————— 

The earsplitting call of a hawk echoes through the valley as he descends. Two weeks earlier he’d flown over Motunui’s wayfinding canoes miles away in the open ocean, their sails pointed back home. 

They’ve most likely been ashore a few days, he estimates, as his feet thud on solid ground, the village children already sprinting towards him. 

Moana appears from beyond a hill, smiling and practically skipping at the sight of him. He waves, kneeling to heft a couple squirming kids onto his shoulders.

He spread his arms, a child clinging to his wrist, “The Mighty Maui has returned from the-“

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” she cuts him off with an eager hop, “Did you see us out there?” 

—————

She tells him about their travels, the unbelievable creatures they saw, the paralyzing breadth of the sea, while the little prince, Keone, toddles about the flat central lawn. He’s much larger, has a full head of hair, and an evolving personality that Sina chuckles at while she chases him. 

They stroll around as he obligingly touches more pregnant bellies and holds (or tosses with the older ones) all 6 of the first generation _good luck via palm_ babies, each as hearty and handsome as the last. 

Moana eventually takes over for her mother, allowing Sina to settle in the shade of a banana tree next to him. They watch as Moana patiently and continuously moves an oblivious Heihei out of reach of the toddler, a thankless, never-ending task. 

"My children," Sina murmurs a bit wistfully. “Sometimes I think I’m too busy looking at Keone, when they’re this age they change everyday! Then I’ll look at Moana…and she seems like a different person each time. She’s changed, too.” 

He snorts in agreement, although it’s not a train of thought he particularity enjoys. She is still _young._ Young enough that _kid_ comes more naturally than anything else _._ But he has to acknowledge what the mother sees, the subtle changes. Her hair is getting longer, thicker, hips beginning to flare with biological imperative, her voice pitching lower with greater control. 

He wonders how many more visits he’ll get before being faced with full-blown adulthood, how long he can hold off the inevitable shift in their dynamic that will follow. With physical and emotional maturity, her strength and spunk and that adorable face will probably start to inspire something _different_. Sure, he’s a demigod, but that leaves him, you know, semi… _man._ He knows himself too well to think he's above those kind of things.

And it’s not like he has a tattoo of anyone else.

“She says they landed on a few other islands, but none of them were as beautiful as Motunui,” Sina shoots him a fond smile. “I'm sure you've been to many islands, Maui, how do you think they compare?”

“ _Many?_ I've been to _all_ of them,” he informs her honestly (maybe a little boastfully). "She's right, though, nothing holds a flame to this place." 

"Then Motunui is blessed," Sina wonders carefully. 

He chuckles, gestures to the ever-expanding pack of children, the crops that seem to grow themselves, the sparkling, teeming waters, "I'd say!"

Sina just looks away pensively. He thought she'd be more pleased, he was hoping to flatter with the assessment, but instead she purses her lips. 

He watches Sina as she watches Moana and yes, that is the third hint and he finally starts to catch on to the undefinable  _difference_ here. There's an unspoken question in her mother's statement but it never fully takes shape. 

—————

Over the next few nights, he regales the villagers with demonstrative retellings of his most recent exploits. He's a demi-man of his word- he'd grappled with a terrifying sea serpent, tricked an ancient cave monster out of some trinkets, and even rescued a small settlement from bands of marauding Kakamora (although it's hard to tell if he actually _killed_ any of those guys). 

She eats it up as enthusiastically as the food, trying and failing to not look enthralled, utterly illuminated again, this time by the tongues of the fire. It’s a comfort that is also distracting, being around faces he recognizes, her plump pet pig curled up between them, he’s almost able to forget all the things he’d rather not deal with. 

At least until it's day again, just another routine, normal, perfect day coming in from the lagoon, traps over flowing and weighed down. Suddenly, one of the fiber lines snaps and lashes Moana across the upper arm, whip fast and whistling. 

It's a nasty gash, could easily get infected, easily leave a scar, but she doesn't seem too upset over the incident.  

"I'm _fine._ Something was bound to happen sooner or later," she grumbles and hisses as he cleans the cut out with salt water and gives her an unimpressed look. "I jumped into Lalotai!" she sasses, "This is _nothing."_

Within a few days, the skin of her arm is smooth, brown, and unblemished. The hints stop being hints and become a paddle beating him over the head. 

—————

Sina is the only person he can go to with his suspicions, she knows exactly what the troubled look on his face means in the serene morning light. He takes the boy from her, props him up on a shoulder so he can play with his curls as they walk to the Meeting Hall. 

"When you said she was changed..." he trails off. 

Sina shrugs, "Maybe more than we thought." 

"And when you said Motunui was blessed?"

The sea is already glittering with the rising sun and Moana's mother turns her eyes from it, "I was wondering blessed by who." 

—————

He leaves again, it's simply what he does, it isn't really a choice. Tui clasps his arm, Moana looks appropriately disappointed, and Sina just nods with that profound understanding good moms have.  

Leaving wouldn't be out of the ordinary, but for the first time it isn't to escape hormonal women or to get his hands dirty. It’s because the thought of staying coalesces into something akin to a of a sack of stones on his chest, resting atop the blunt uncertainty. They _don't know_ anything really, for sure, so why keep worrying. They don't know if she's going to live forever or die tragically or suddenly sprout vegetation and become a _literal island_. There's no way to know if she's really, truly been _changed,_  or if Motunui's unnatural fertility is just random good fortune. 

 _All Around Good Luck Charm my hook,_  he thinks gloomily. He's in his shark body, patrolling the edge of a much-less-populated reef, sourly nipping at anything that dares get too close.

In the end, he left, and this part is hard to admit, because he spent _a thousand years_ alone and it sucked. He _hated it._ Was absolutely miserable. The thought, the mere possibility of a constant, that someone will greet him as a friend forever, whatever forever even looks like…

The hope that produces is literally painful. 

To think he's been so nervous about her just _growing up._

—————

The next time he flies overhead, an ordinary gull, the voyaging canoes are gone. It's not quite relief or disappointment that he feels, but it's easy to adjust his course and keep soaring. He'll see her out there. 

—————

Months drift, but he doesn’t earn a new tattoo, doesn’t touch another pregnant belly. People still find him _awesome_ and _impressive_ and _unforgettable,_ but he doesn’t know one face from another and the sun on their islands seems a bit dimmer. 

He’s a dolphin, swirling through a lazy current with no real objective, humming a little tune punctuated with dolphin chatter when he catches something out of the corner of his eye. He agilely flips to watch as a large shadow emerges from the murk. 

The enormous manta ray gives him a pointed look before gliding past, wings waving as the current picks it up. 

His dolphin eyes don’t roll like a human’s would, but he tries none-the-less. A powerful pump of his tail has him airborne, there’s a clap, and his hawk wings take him higher. 

—————

The moon is a only a sliver, but that means the stars are practically blinding. They guided him right back and now allow him to pick up her form from afar, teeny and colorful in the starlight. This time she’s waded up her thighs, dancing sedately.  He drifts up slowly as a sea turtle, circling her calves a couples times before hefting himself onto the sand with flippers one instant, hands the next. 

She plops down beside him a moment later, her smile is genuine, by she seems _tired._

“Looking for your Gramma again?” he wonders casually. 

She bites her lip and shrugs, “I was…I guess I was asking her to get you for me.” 

He grunts, “She’s quick.” 

“You’ve been gone almost a year.” 

He smiles apologetically, knocks her shoulder with his, “What’d I miss?” 

The look on her face is indescribable, determined and frightened and a million other unfathomable things, like striding across the ocean floor. 

“Well, I accidentally burned off all my hair trying to cook yams.” 

He glances around her shoulders to where her hair falls in thick glossy waves halfway down her back, “When?”

She laughs a little humorlessly, “Yesterday morning.” 

He tenses when she glances at him and he decides that he can't really call these things _hints_ anymore. 

Her tone isn't accusatory, exactly, but it’s in the family, “You suspected something.”

It’s not a question yet he nods anyway. 

“Do you know what I am now?” 

He slowly blows a breath out between his teeth, “I don’t…I don’t know any better than you, kid.” 

When he is able to brace himself and looks her at her, really look, the necklace and hair and still ridiculously wide eyes catching and reflecting back every spark of starlight, he realizes that whatever she’s become, _kid_ won’t be the right word anymore.

“But how about I stick around until we do?” 

She nods and the stars multiply as her eyes fill with tears. 

“I’m still not sure how I feel,” she whispers.

 _Who would?_ his face says. 

—————

The villagers look at her with the same, weird gratitude that was once reserved for him. But hers is mixed with comfortable affection and intimacy that he’s just now getting close to. 

It’s obvious that he’s missed things besides cooking related hair miracles, things that have earned her respect, distinction. The women ask them both to touch their bellies. 

“It didn’t make any difference before if I touched them, why should it matter now?” she mutters as Keone runs by, Heihei perched unstably on his head. 

Maui allows a laugh to escape that echoes across the valley, “It serves you right!” 

He spreads his arms out theatrically, “Moana, Wayfinder, Demi-something of Dumb Chickens and And All Around Good Luck Charm!”

She doesn’t look as sad as the night before, even blushes a bit and smacks him on the chest while Mini Maui takes cover, “Shut up.”

The island is so bright, buzzing and glowing and she’s the most radiant thing on it, “That’s still better than ‘Princess’.”

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not making excuses, this was me wanting them to be together forever and then attempting to write something around that unreasonably desire.


End file.
